Aquitanian/Basque

Recently several scholars have studied Basque with regard to other languages to which it
might be related and have concluded that Aquitanian appears to have been its forerunner.
Thus they have postulated an Aquitanian/Basque language family, with Basque being the
only extant example. In the early 20th century, linguists believed that a language family which
they called Iberian once existed in western Europe, mostly in and near the Iberian peninsula.
They thought then that Basque was a descendant of Iberian. This theory has now been
conclusively disproven. Thus, at present, Basque is the only known representative of the
Aquitanian/Basque family.

Note that a language called Iberian was spoken at the time of the Roman conquest along the
Mediterranean coast of Spain, but linguists do not now believe it related to any other known
language. There was also a language which has been given the name Tartessian spoken in
southwestern Spain and southern Portugal about the same time, but again we know of no relation
between Tartessian and any other language.

Burushaski

updated 5-17-2001
Burushaski is spoken in northwestern Kashmir. It is apparently unrelated
to any other language, and therefore is treated as constituting its own language
family. Burushaski has never been committed to writing, although it may be repre-
sented by the Latin alphabet.
915.49 Swift, Hugh
S977t Trekking in Pakistan and India. -- San Francisco : Sierra
Club Books, 1990
RID: 89-10167 ITEM #: bus00001

Rhaetian

updated 5-17-2001
Rhaetian (Etruscan) belongs to the Etruscan family of languages. Rhaetian
should not be confused with Rhetian, which is an alternate name for Rhaeto-Romanic, an
Indo-Hittite language.
457 Conway, Robert Seymour, 1864-1933
C767p The prae-Italic dialects ...
RID: 78-356988 ITEM #: rhe00001